


The First T’hy’la

by Reyka_Sivao



Category: Star Trek
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gay, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Period-Typical Sexism, Pon Farr, Queer Character, Queer Themes, Vulcan Biology, Vulcan Culture, Women Being Awesome, t’hy’la
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-10
Updated: 2020-11-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:54:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27486091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reyka_Sivao/pseuds/Reyka_Sivao
Summary: A tale of two ancient Vulcan men who found refuge in each other, the woman who helped them, and the origin of the term T’hy’la.
Relationships: Original Vulcan Character(s)/Original Character(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	The First T’hy’la

**Author's Note:**

  * For [grumpyphoenix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/grumpyphoenix/gifts).
  * Inspired by [After the Blood Rush](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24469120) by [grumpyphoenix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/grumpyphoenix/pseuds/grumpyphoenix). 



> The narrative portions are “what really happened” as opposed to being the epic analyzed in the academic bits. I thought about writing the actual poem, but like, that’s a lot of work for something no one else can read lol.

_T’hy’la t’du,_ or “Your T’hy’la” is a piece of literature from Vulcan antiquity of which only fragments remain. It tells the stuory of two men whose friendship was strong enough to save them both...or, in more likely interpretations, the story of two male lovers. 

While not the earliest recorded instance of same-sex couples in Vulcan history, this fragment of an apparently much longer epic is especially influential for being the origin of the term “T’hy’la”. 

—

The desert wind blew cold as the sun peered over the horizon. 

Svanek was already sitting on a low, flat stone, staring at the colors slowly shifting away from the deep colors of night. 

Lorev came up behind him and took a seat to his friend’s left. Svanek made no indication of having noticed, but they both knew he had. 

“The ceremony will be tomorrow at dawn.”

“Has she made her choice?”

“Yes.”

Lorev sighed and said nothing. 

“Please, Lorev.”

“I gave you my word.”

“Thank you.”

They sat in silence for another long moment, watching as the colors in the sky warmed and brightened. 

Svanek’s hand began to tremble. 

“Do you wish to be alone?”

Svanek curled his hand to stop the shaking. “Please stay.”

“I will.”

“I wish…” Svanek trailed off. 

“What do you wish?”

“No, it is impossible.”

Lorev shifted slightly. “Perhaps not. But I wish to know.”

“I would meld with you one more time.”

The words caught in Lorev’s throat. “I would risk it.”

“No,” said Svanek. “No. It...I need you to be able...please. Please do not let it be the fire that takes me.”

Lorev stayed silent, but he brushed his fingers across the back of his friend’s hand in the strongest gesture of comfort that was left to them. 

Together, they sat and watched time pass in front of them as the desert wind turned from cold to hot.

—

Not much is known about Svanek and Lorev’s early years, but it is clear that they had been close for some time before the events of the remaining fragment of the epic. Even their respective years of birth are not entirely clear, although it is reasonable to assume that they were in their late twenties at the time. 

This verse attests to the close relationship they had even before the events of the kal-if-fee. 

—

The gong echoed across the desert. 

Lorev curled his fingers into a fist, trying to hide it behind the blue fibers of the belt that marked him as an attendant of the groom. 

Svanek stepped away from the gong and waited for the bride’s party to approach. 

His condition had deteriorated quickly. He had refused sleep and sustenance for the last three days, and Lorev’s heart twisted in his side as he watched Svanek’s hands trembling as he clenched the ceremonial mallet. 

For a moment, just a moment, he hoped that she had changed her mind. 

But no. That would not happen. 

The bridal party came into view, Svanek’s clan matriarch commanding attention with her regal presence, followed by Svanek’s intended, T’hy’la. 

It was a bridal party without a bride. 

Lorev looked away as Svanek hit the gong the second time.

T’hy’la stepped forward. Svanek didn’t even make a show of attempting to strike the gong the traditional third time before T’hy’la placed her palm, almost in slow motion, against the gong. 

Svanek let the hammer fall from his nerveless fingers as a wave of shock rippled around those few in attendance. Lorev almost envied their surprise. 

The matriarch turned towards T’hy’la and steepled her hands. 

“Thou hast chosen the Challenge. Art thou prepared to become the property of the victor?”

T’hy’la swallowed. “I...I am.”

“Then choose thy champion.”

T’hy’la closed her eyes, turned, and raised her arm unerringly. 

“I choose this one.”

T’hy’la’s eyes met Lorev’s, but his attention was more split between the near-horror spreading through the crowd at the intended bride choosing a member of the _groom’s_ party…and the sight of Svanek’s eyes losing everything he had ever known in him. 

“Lorev? Doest thou accept the combat?”

Lorev closed his eyes, his promise bitter on his tongue. 

“I accept.”

He stood there in that moment of betrayal, holding himself there and willing time not to pass, until the smooth shaft of a lirpa was thrust into his hands. 

He didn’t want to open his eyes. 

Nevertheless he forced them to open and take in the sight of his closest friend’s empty face coming toward him with murder in his blank eyes. 

He let his body take over. 

The lirpa swung in his hand to deflect and attack, but _he_ was not controlling it. He could not. Not if he was to keep his promise. 

When the first green drops hit the sand below their feet, he did not know whose it was. 

—

When a woman chose the challenge, it was generally the expectation that she would have brought her own preferred victor as one of her attendants. T’hy’la choosing one brought by her intended groom was a notably strange choice that would have caught those in attendance completely unawares, potentially even more so had they been aware of the closeness shared by the two men. 

The fact that Lorev did not even question the choice is strong evidence that all three players knew exactly how the challenge would go.

—

It was too easy. 

It was supposed to be a _challenge._

He knew why. He knew that Svanek had refused anything that could help him. 

That was his promise and his curse. 

_Let her go,_ Svanek had begged him. _She cannot do this for me, and I will not force her._

Lorev swung another blow. He could have done it. He could have ended it. But the tiniest change in aim turned it into another non-lethal blow. 

_Please,_ Svanek whispered in his memory, _do not let it be the fire._

Lorev spun away again when he could have attacked. Svanek was deprived of both sleep and food, by his own choice. He was the easiest of easy opponents. 

_Do not let it be the fire that takes me._

Lorev jerked up, and in a moment of determination, threw away both the lirpa and the pretense. 

Svanek paused, though surely he was past the point of interpreting any such gesture. 

“You wished me to claim T’hy’la.” A silence deeper than before settled around them. 

“You wished me to claim her from you and set her free from your need.”

Svanek had stopped completely at the sound of his voice, though he could not possibly understand the words. 

“I…” Lorev’s voice cracked. “I cannot keep that promise.” He took one step closer to his friend. “But if I cannot do that, then at least let me share this fate with you. Let me be your T’hy’la.”

He reached out his hand and touched the meld points on Svanek’s face. 

—

While there where undoubtedly same-sex couplings before Svanek and Lorev, it is unlikely that they would have been aware of them. It is far more likely that Lorev assumed that, by melding with him, he was going to be swept into the plak tow himself, and was consigning himself to the same fate that awaited Svanek if he did not take a mate. 

—

“Take them.”

“Why do you insist on such a pointless action? They have chosen to die together, and you will be free.”

T’hy’la took a deep breath. “They did not question my need for freedom. I will not question their need for each other. Let them try.”

The matriarch eyed for a long moment that T’hy’la held without blinking. 

“Very well.”

The matriarch turned to the masked guards. “Take them to the place of seclusion.”

“As you say,” said the leader of the guards. 

“And you?” said the matriarch to T’hy’la. “What will you do if they do live?”

T’hy’la closed eyes. “I do not know.”

“You desired freedom enough to sacrifice your intended bondmate’s life, and you give up this?”

“What would you have had me do?” T’hy’la closed her eyes again. “I cannot perform the duty you would have me do. I cannot. He understood that, as you apparently do not.” She opened her eyes again. “I never desired death. I desired a freedom that you gave me no other path to seek. He willingly opened that path to me when you did not. If there is the smallest chance I can repay that debt, I will.”

“Then I will not deny you that risk.”

The matriarch turned away. T’hy’la watched her go, but made no more to leave. 

“You will stay, then.”

“I will.”

”It will likely be for nothing.”

“I know.”

“Then do as you will.”

T’hy’la did not wait to watch the matriarch’s departure. 

—

It was too much. Everything was too much. Everything burned. Everything hurt. 

Rough hands shoved directions. There was a direction, but direction didn’t matter.

Was there a promise? There was a promise.

A last shove, and then something soft. Something that didn’t hurt quite as much. 

Not that it was enough. Nothing would ever be enough. 

Rough hands. Face points. Something. Something past the flame. 

Something, ANYTHING, past the flame-hurt-pain. 

Something that was...familiar.

A promise. 

A promise failed but a promise kept. Something not alone. 

The fingers finalized the link. 

It was agony and ecstasy. The burning doubled and halved, and there was SOMEONE. 

Him. It was him. It was impossible but it was within reach. He was within reach. 

_Please, please yes, please no._

_Please...please, must._

It was impossible to know who was who anymore. Was he begging to do, or not do? Do what?

Then there was skin on skin and a white-hot sweetness that burned hotter than the blood in their veins. 

—

Establishing a marriage bond when one partner is already under the influence of the blood fever is a dangerous prospect under the best of circumstances, and if necessary only attempted with the assistance of a trained healer. 

Without that assistance, partners risk both psychic damage from uncontrolled telepathic contact, as well as physical injury if the bond did not properly convey pain from excessive force. (Normally partners are attuned enough to create a feedback loop that prevents serious harm.)

That, combined with the fact that most men in that state would automatically consider another man a threat or a competitor, as well as Svanek’s already weakened state, meant that the assumption of their deaths was not unwarranted. 

—

T’hy’la waited. 

There was a fairly long hall from her toward the place of seclusion...where the bride and groom were traditionally taken following the ceremony to consummate the marriage. It was where she was meant to be right now. 

There was no tradition that told her to be here. No script to follow, not anymore. Her life was suddenly in freefall. 

But she had to know. 

—

This is the verse that causes the most debate in both historical and literary circles. Literally, it only says that T’hy’la “waited with them”—some, more invested in the status quo, have focused on the “with them” part, and argued that she was there with them, having changed her mind and decided to take on the part of the bride for both of them. 

However, this usage of “waiting” as a kind of sexual euphemism is completely unattested in contemporary literature. It is far more likely in context that “waiting” is exactly what it says, and scholars have especially raised the theory that she played the part of their attendant, waiting to see whether they would be able to weather the fever alone.

—

Water. 

It wasn’t a coherent thought by any means, but it was conscious in a way that was new. He was...thirsty. 

Lorev opened his eyes. 

An unfamiliar ceiling greeted him, but it wasn’t just that that seemed strange. Something was wrong. Something he couldn’t place. 

He ached all over, and a stabbing pain pulsed in the ribs over his heart, but that wasn’t what was bothering him either. 

He took a deep breath, feeling the life fill his aching lungs, and it hit him—

He was _alive._

Lorev sat up sharply, or tried to. The pain in his side jabbed into him and forced him back down. He took a measured breath to try and calm the sting, and instead attempted to roll onto his side. 

He wasn’t sure what he would see, but he dreaded what he might. How? How had he lived? Would he encounter Svanek’s bloody corpse? Or worse, T’hy’la’s unwilling form?

Gingerly, dreadfully, he shifted his weight. 

Svanek’s face met him when he turned. Pale. Eyes closed. The greenish bloom of bruises appearing over his body.

But _breathing._

Lorev’s heart almost stopped. It could not be true. Surely this was some cruel trick, some dying fantasy of the impossible. 

But…

He reached out, slow enough not to hurt more than he could bear, and touched the closest part of Svanek’s arm. 

It was weak, but the thread of his consciousness still pulsed beneath his skin. 

Perhaps it was a dream. But it was a good dream. 

“ _Wake_ ,” whispered Lorev, willing it through his fingers into his friend’s awareness. 

It took a moment that lasted a lifetime. But then Svanek’s eyelashes fluttered and his eyes cracked open a fraction. 

They looked exhausted, but Svanek was behind them again in a way Lorev had never dreamed of hoping. 

For a long moment, their locked eyes was the only communication between them. 

Svanek parted his lips and and tried twice before he could force his throat to cooperate. 

“How?”

Lorev stroked his hand down Svanek’s arm the fraction ihe could manage without pain. “I have not asked.”

Svanek closed his eyes a moment with an expression like a grimace. “Would a dream come with pain?”

Lorev tried to sit up again, more carefully this time, but again the pain in his side prevented him. 

He let out a laugh, low and bitter. 

“I asked to be your T’hy’la,” he said softly, reconnecting his fingers to Svanek’s arm. “But had I truly been your intended, there would at least have been an attendant just past us in case of injury.”

Svanek smiled the smallest fraction. “I begged you only to not let it be the fire. Nothing else.” He took a moment to gather himself before trying to sit up, but he too was halted by some internal pain. 

“At least we are here together.”

That would have been enough, to once more share the light behind one another’s eyes. 

But then, the door cracked open. 

Svanek was too weak to turn to look, but Lorev was facing that way already. 

He blinked and then croaked with shock. 

“T’hy’la?”

The woman came nearer and knelt next to the low bed. “I have brought you water.”

That was a main function of the attendant who would have waited outside their chamber had they been the married couple. But there was no one who should have been there for this, no one who would have been assigned this duty.

“T’hy’la?” asked Svanek, still not quite able to turn to look. 

“I am here.”

Carefully, T’hy’la reached over and slipped her arm under Svanek’s shoulders, taking most of the weight to lift him far enough to drink from the bowl she held. He might have tried for more, but she pulled away. “A little now,” she said. “More later.”

She stood and moved around to Lorev’s side of the bed to repeat the process. He too would have taken more if she had allowed him. 

When she had finished with both of them, she carefully set the bowl aside. 

“...how?” croaked Lorev, throat still raw even after the worst of the thirst was slaked. 

“You declared you would stand for me,” said T’hy’la simply. “You melded with Svanek.”

“But….how?”

T’hy’la inhaled and looked aside. 

“I asked that you be brought to this place.”

Svanek was the one who questioned this time. “Why did you...believe…?”

T’hy’la inclined her head slightly. “I did not know,” she said. “Perhaps I would only have served as the first person to announce your funerals. But…” she hesitated. “But...even if the chance was small, it was the only thing I could offer in repayment.”

Svanek shook his head slightly. “No repayment,” he said. “Not when what I offered was already yours.”

T’hy’la smiled. “A gift, then. A gift for a gift.” Her smile faded slightly. “Still, I must summon the healers. I will return.”

She stood and left the chamber, leaving Lorev and Svanek with only each other and the wonder of each successive moment.

—

The survival of both men presented a challenge to the legal orthodoxy of the time, which was rooted entirely in tradition, and left little room for innovation. 

If one had survived, T’hy’la would have been considered his property. Svanek’s original intent had been for Lorev to use that power to free her. 

If, in the rarer case, neither had survived, T’hy’la would have been considered a free actor for the rest of her life. 

But to have _both_ survive was an unprecedented situation in the region’s leading clans, and left the legal state of all three of them, but most especially T’hy’la, hanging in the air.

—

“Then which man shall she be the property of?”

It was at least the eighth time the same question had been raised. 

In frustration, Svanek stood. He was still weak, and leaned heavily on a staff. 

“Honored elders,” he started. 

All eyes were immediately on him, for it was not his place to speak.

“Honored elders,” he continued. “While I have said before that, as neither of us would be alive if not for her actions, my former intended should be considered on those terms and afforded every protection that you would also afford me, I accept that your judgment is based on the history and precedent of those who came before us.” He inhaled. “By that standard, she would have been afforded as the property of whomever survived our combat.” He glanced around Lorev. “I therefore submit that, as we both survived the combat, both of us are afforded equal shares of T’hy’la under the law.”

A murmur whispered its way between the attendees. 

“And whose home would she live in, then?” asked one of the elders.

It was Lorev’s turn to stand. “She will always have a place,” he said, putting his hand on Svanek’s arm, “in our home.”

The murmuring grew louder, but Lorev simply raised his voice. 

“I chose to stand as his T’hy’la,” he said. “Those words were truer than I knew.”

“It is not proper,” said a different elder. 

“I have already followed him into death,” said Lorev. “There is no sting in impropriety.”

Before the murmur could turn to outcry, Svanek’s clan matriarch, who was leading the council, spoke her piece. 

“Whether their conduct is _proper_ or not is not the purpose of this council.” She raised her hand to signal her final decision. “T’hy’la pledged herself to be property of the victor. As both men have survived, and may lay equal claim to her, then for as long as they are in agreement of her fate, that shall be her lot.”

She dropped her hand, and silence fell. 

Svanek sat down heavily, and Lorev followed suit to keep his steadying hand on his arm. Svanek closed his eyes a moment to breathe a moment of faintness away. 

When he opened his eyes, T’hy’la was standing before them.

“Forgive me,” said Svanek. 

T’hy’la shook her head. “I could have asked for no more. This ruling is more than I could have hoped.”

“You could have hoped for freedom.”

“I could. But...a life for a life.”

—

A great part of the middle of the poem is unfortunately lost to history. However, between the remaining fragments near the end and references in contemporaneous and subsequent literature, it appears that they did indeed form a household of sorts, though T’hy’la preferred to travel much of the time. 

Because of this arrangement, however, most at the time would have thought that the whispered scandal around them involved polyandry rather than homosexuality. 

This is the origin of the _t’hy’la_ references among sexual minorities. Since, on the surface, it might seem to reference to friendship strong enough to “share” a wife, there was something of a factor of plausible deniability as a shield against prejudice. However, as the story spread, those who had reason to listen heard a different story. The story that spread through these underground spaces was that of the two men who had chosen each other and the woman who had gained her freedom. 

Over time, the literary reference became more opaque, but the term remained in use even among those who were unaware that any reference was being made. Eventually it became fully lexicalized and today it is most often used as a term of endearment among same-sex couples, even as they have become more socially accepted and less requiring of euphemisms or polite fictions about the nature of their relationship. 


End file.
